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2016 Saw the Second Highest Number of Arrivals in Canadian History: Tourism Snapshot

The Tourism Snapshot provides a monthly and year-to-date update on key Destination Canada market visits to and from Canada, performance of competitors, and other tourism related statistics. Supporting statistical tables may also be viewed on our website at:

With 19.98 million international overnight arrivals, 2016 saw the second highest number of arrivals in Canadian history, falling only 0.4% short of the record high set in 2002 (20.06 million).

In 2016, robust overnight arrivals were achieved in all DC international markets, with arrivals from the United States, up 9.7%, realizing its highest observed level since 2005, and arrivals from DC overseas markets, up 16.0%, topping the record high established in 2015.

Overnight arrivals from the US in 2016 hit 13.90 million, up 9.7% over 2015. The strong performance of US arrivals was underpinned by remarkable growth in arrivals by air (+17.4%) throughout 2016 and solid overall gains in auto arrivals (+6.8%). The number of Americans arriving to Canada by air breached the 4 million mark for the first time with 4.53 million arrivals, an all-time high nearly 15.3% higher than the previous peak from 2004.

In 2016, strong performances in all DC overseas markets helped establish new record peaks for DC overseas markets, DC Europe, DC Asia-Pacific, and DC Latin America. Individual DC markets with new record peaks include France, China, South Korea, India, Australia, and Brazil.

Capping off a remarkable year for international arrivals to Canada, December 2016’s total of 1.34 million international overnight arrivals set a new record for arrivals for that month with 11.3% growth over the previous high set in 2015.

In December 2016, solid double-digit gains were set in 9 of DC’s 10 overseas markets, with exceptionally high results emerging from Mexico (+69.1%) and India (+43.4%), as well as record December monthly numbers for France (+22.1%), Germany (+19.0%), China (+17.7%), Australia (+23.1%) and Brazil (+23.2%).